


Don't

by shiverfawkes



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt, Not Canon Compliant, Post-Reichenbach, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Reichenbach Feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-11
Updated: 2018-12-11
Packaged: 2019-09-16 14:34:16
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,165
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16955817
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shiverfawkes/pseuds/shiverfawkes
Summary: don't come at me for technicalities, im just all in for the angst at this point. Ash I hope you feel pain, because I am not prepared for yours lmaoedit: @ ash, congrats you won the angst off, and there is no longer enough water in my body to cry





	Don't

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Caring_Is_Not_An_Advantage](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Caring_Is_Not_An_Advantage/gifts).



> don't come at me for technicalities, im just all in for the angst at this point. Ash I hope you feel pain, because I am not prepared for yours lmao
> 
>  
> 
> edit: @ ash, congrats you won the angst off, and there is no longer enough water in my body to cry

Sherlock didn’t sleep that often. He was always up and moving, even if it was only in his head, everything was moving, spinning turning, always working.

When he did sleep however, that all stopped. Stood still. Not much could wake him up, other than himself.

Not much, besides the screams of John Watson.

It was muffled through the ceiling and the walls, but he definitely heard it, so he pulled himself up from the sofa where he’d been lying for the past five hours, and made his way upstairs, to see if he could help. It wasn’t likely until John woke, but it never hurt to try.

The closer he got to the door, the more he could hear. He knew never to try and wake John in one of his nightmares, that could end with a bloody nose or a black eye. So instead, he put his back to the door and slid down to the floor, drawing his knees up to his chest, holding himself.

As much as it hurt him to listen, he didn’t have the will to go do something else.

“No… No, don’t- Don’t please!” His cries always grew louder before they winked out into crying, and heart racing, breathless awakenings.

John had two types of nightmares now. Two types that recurred.

“He’s my friend! He’s my- he’s my friend… Please…”

There’s the crying.

There was an abrupt shuffle of fabric, and a pained groan from John, all muffled by the door, but definitely still there.

Sherlock stood up and knocked the door. “John?”

There wasn’t an answer.

Sherlock opened the door carefully.

John was sat on his bed, knees drawn to his chest in a manner Sherlock hadn't been aware he was capable of. His gaze was fixated on the door as it opened, and then on Sherlock as he entered.

“Oh Christ. Oh _no_.” He breathed out the words as he stared at the detective.

“John?” Sherlock asked, but John put his face between his knees and chose to ignore him. “John are you alright?” His tone was more urgent now, and flashes of the pool crossed his mind. Was that really the last time he’d asked?

The doctor muttered to himself. Something that Sherlock couldn’t hear, until he raised his head and glared at the detective. “You aren’t real. I-I know you aren’t real. I’m not mad, I’m _not_.” His face was stained with tears, barely visible in the darkness.

A Reichenbach dream then. He should’ve known.

“John. I am here, really, you aren’t mad.” He stepped forward, just a little bit, if he could just touch the doctor, he’d realise. He needed to reassure the man in front of him.

“You can’t be here. I can’t talk to you, I'm not crazy.” John replied, running a trembling hand through his unruly hair.

Sherlock shivered as he moved toward him, John’s room was always colder than his. The warmth made him more susceptible to Afghanistan nightmares, Sherlock knew that. “John I’ve been here for the past few months, you know that.” He knew it was his fault that John was like this now, he knew he’d done this, it winded him in a way he never had been before.

“You haven’t been, that was a dream, of _course_ it was a dream.” He laughed bitterly, rubbing the tear tracks away from his cheeks. “I can’t talk to you.” It sounded more like he was telling himself than telling Sherlock.

“John, I-“ He reached to place a hand on John’s shoulder, but he flinched away before the detective’s hand met.

He avoided Sherlock’s confused stare.

“Don’t.” John’s voice was that deadly kind of stern, soft but yet so threatening, the type where Sherlock knew he’d stepped out of line. “Don’t touch me.”

“Why?”

“Because I bloody said so. _Why_ do you need an explanation? You’re in my head all the time you should know anyway.”

Then it clicked. It clicked so fast that Sherlock’s stomach lurched, and he felt legitimately sick.

“I'm not the first.” He whispered, feeling his heart drop in his chest, and shatter into a thousand pieces as it fell to the floor.

“Took you long enough.”

He didn’t know what to say. He didn’t know what to do. He felt paralysed as he stood there. He didn’t like this, he didn’t like what he’d done, he didn’t like that this is how it turned out. It was never supposed to be this way. “I'm sorry.”

“No, you aren’t.” John laughed, it was filled with anger, enough that Sherlock, visibly recoiled, taking a step back from him. “Don’t even try that shit with me. If you were sorry you’d have let me help, you wouldn’t have taken the bait, you wouldn’t have fallen.”

“John-“

“Or you’d have at least let me try to catch you.” Sherlock didn’t have a reply to that, he was frozen, stuck unsure of what to do. “Get out.”

He bit his lip, unaware of a way to fix this, to make it better, to _help_. “Please, I-“

“Out, Sherlock!” It was a strangled cry, and he was in more distress than Sherlock had ever seen him in. He was defenceless and weak and scared.

Sherlock had done this to him.

He didn’t dare say anything else, or else John would shout loud enough to wake Mrs Hudson.

He supposed the only thing left for it was to try and prove it. Prove he was real if John wouldn’t believe him.

He flicked the kettle on, ignoring the fact that his own tears fell from his cheeks as he waited for it to boil. Ignoring the fact that his own hands were shaking as he grabbed John’s favourite mug. Ignoring the fact that strangled sobs forced themselves from his lips as he poured the milk in.

It took up a small space in his hard-drive, how John liked his tea. It was a small space in a much larger, very important section. Sherlock had only ever made tea for him once, but he’d kept it, and held on to it just like everything else. He kept every detail he could manage about him. So, if for some reason, he forgot everything about John Watson, his smell, his appearance, his voice. If he forgot all that, he’d still have something, even if it was just the way he liked his tea. Or what his favourite mug was.

Throwing a few biscuits on a plate, he tore a piece of paper from an envelope, and managed to scribble a note, before walking up the stairs.

He knocked John’s door, four gentle raps to the wood, before he set the note under the mug and slipped back downstairs, falling back to the sofa, and doing the same thing that brought all of this on, listening.

Only this time there were tears, his tears, even if he didn’t acknowledge them.

_When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. – SH_

 

 


End file.
